The heart, as it is
by FireBurnsBrighter
Summary: Okay (adj.) Satisfactory but not especially good. / For John, the distinction between dream and reality is barely there. But he's okay, of course.


**A/N; I've wanted to try the bracket technique for a long time, so this is my attempt. The story really jumps about, and there are a ****_lot_**** of brackets. Also quotes. So hopefully you don't get too confused. I apologise in advance.**

* * *

The nights are the worst. During my waking hours I can at least pretend to think about other things, I can try to blot it all out. But at night, I can't stop the memories from flooding in.

* * *

_Goodbye, John._

_Sherlock, no!_

* * *

You told me once that you weren't a hero

(Don't make people into heroes, John)

_Nobody could be that clever._

(Heroes don't exist, and if they did I wouldn't be one of them)

There were times I didn't even think you were human

(You_ machine_)

But- let me tell you this. You were the best man

_(Sherlock Holmes is a great man - and I think one day - if we're very, very lucky, he might even be a good one.)_

The most human- human being

(Mrs Hudson leave Baker Street? England would fall.)

That I've ever known, and no-one will ever convince me that you told me a lie.

_(I'm a fake)_

* * *

The pitying looks from Sarah became too much. I moved surgeries.

After a month, the weekly visits to the pub with Lestrade stopped.

Mrs Hudson has long stopped sending her biscuits.

_My days are nightmares and my dreams are my reality._

* * *

_My brother has the brain of a scientist or a philosopher and yet he elects to be a detective. What might we deduce about his heart? _

_I don't know. _

_Neither do I. But initially, he wanted to be a pirate._

* * *

Ah, childhood. The kingdom where nobody dies and love means forever.

Where adventure never ends and blood is never spilled and your name isn't the last word ever uttered by the person you live for.

* * *

The limp's back. The cane is dug out. The gun is burried at the back of a drawer like I tried to do with my memories of you in my head. One worked, the other didn't.

They're both in my dreams, though.

* * *

Hello?

John.

Sherlock, are you okay?

_(There is nothing wrong with me do you understand?)_

Turn around and walk back the way you came.

(Just do as I ask)

Please.

_(What would I know, I'm just your friend.)_

_(I don't have 'friends')_

Look up, I'm on the rooftop.

Oh, God.

(If you were dying, if you'd been murdered. In your very last few seconds, what would you say?)

('Please, God, let me live.')

Goodbye, John.

* * *

Lisa is nice, but I can't help noticing the way she absently rubs her hand over her left ring finger as we talk over dinner.

When she gives me her number, I don't promise to call. I smile and walk away instead.

I tell myself it's because she's married, not because she had black tumbling curls and brown eyes that glinted the same way yours did when you found something interesting.

* * *

What's going on?

An apology.

_(I'm sorry it ended this way Sherlock. I'm so, so sorry)_

* * *

When the black car follows me home, I don't get in. It stops after two weeks, and I suppose Mycroft must have got the message that I want nothing to do with him.

* * *

_I don't have friends, I've just got one._

(This is my friend, John Watson.)

_How many friends do you expect he has?_

(I don't have 'friends')

_Alone is what I have, alone protects me._

_No, friends protect people._

(You_ have_ just killed a man)

But, he wasn't a very nice man

_Take my hand_

(Now people'll definitely talk)

People do little else.

_We're not a couple!_

_Yes, you are. _

(I'll burn the _heart_ out of you.)

There's another bedroom upstairs, if you'll be needing two bedrooms.

_Actually I've got a date_

_What?_

_It's where two people who like each other go out and have fun_

(That's what I was suggesting!)

_Let me through, please. He's my friend._

* * *

Mary is nothing like you, and maybe that's why we go on a second date, and a third, and a fourth.

She has dishwater blonde hair, dark green eyes, a bright smile, and only comes up to my nose even in high heels.

She's a primary school teacher. Grounded, practical.

We met when I found her cat in the front garden of my flat.

You would call her dull, Sherlock. But at least she never tries to posion my coffee. She's what I need.

* * *

Are you okay?

Yes, yes. I'll be fine.

* * *

Why does everybody ask that? Of course I'm fine.

Fine is being able to function. Fine is breathing, fine is existing.

Fine is satisfactory. Fine is being able to walk away from the blood on the pavement which you neither caused nor stopped. I'm fine.

* * *

It's okay.

_No it's not!_

(And trust me, it isn't.)

* * *

A year has passed and not much has changed.

I've been on thirty two dates with Mary now.

That's enough to notice the way she curls her hair around her finger when she's nervous or lying or both.

Enough to notice that her favourite item of clothing has to be her blue cardigan with the white buttons, because she's worn it six times more than the red one, and it looks like it's been stitched up numerous times.

Enough to notice that she asks for two sugars in her coffee from the waitress but always adds another when she gets it because she likes it sweet.

Enough to notice that she's wonderful and beautiful and_ right,_ but that she's not you.

* * *

_That depends, how often do you leave?_

Not enough and too often, Sherlock, but at least I always come back.

* * *

We're engaged now. It seemed like about the right time.

_(And I love her.)_

Seventy dates, twenty nine nights over and two toothbrushes in my bathroom instead of one probably means it's time.

It's strange moving on, because I wonder if this would have happened anyway, if you were here.

I would have been happier, that's so obvious it's stupid to state it.

It's strange.

* * *

This phone call- it's my note.

(I prefer to text)

That's what people do, don't they?

(Since when do you care what people think?)

Leave a note.

_Leave a note when?_

Goodbye, John.

_Goodbye, Sherlock._

* * *

Moving on, it's so strange. I always thought it'd be with you.

* * *

_My best friend, Sherlock Holmes, is dead._

* * *

**A/N; i've now written a sort of companion piece entitled 'once more, for love' which is kind of the same sort of thing but from sherlock's point of view. you might want to read it because it actually extends to them reuniting, though you dont really have to. so... yeah :)**


End file.
